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The Ryan Response

January 25, 2011 10:51 pmJanuary 25, 2011 10:51 pm

… was as bad as you might expect. Lots of breast-beating about deficits; you’d never know that no leading Republican, Ryan very
much included, has offered a serious proposal to cut the deficit. Some cooked statistics about federal spending. And then there was this curious assertion:

Just take a look at what’s happening to Greece, Ireland, the United Kingdom and other nations in Europe. They didn’t act soon enough; and now their governments have been forced to impose painful austerity
measures: large benefit cuts to seniors and huge tax increases on everybody.

Greece maybe fits that description. But if you’d read anything about the euro crisis — like this article — you’d know that Ireland was running a budget surplus on the eve of the crisis, and had quite low debt. Its problems now have nothing to do with fiscal irresponsibility in the past; they’re
the consequence of weak financial regulation and the government’s too-generous bank bailout.

Oh, and the UK: was it “forced to impose painful austerity”? Here’s the interest rate on 10-year UK bonds:

There was no sign of a crisis of confidence in the UK budget before the May election; the Conservative government chose to embark on austerity, it wasn’t forced into it.

So I guess we’re supposed to take heed of what Ryan believes happened in Europe, never mind that it isn’t what actually happened.